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This crunchy, sweet-sour, festively purple slaw has been in regular rotation since my new-found obsession with fresh pomegranate started a few weeks ago. And especially during the Crazy Season, it’s hard to beat: quick & easy to throw together (the biggest chunk of time is spent seeding the pomegranate); hits all the right notes of sweetness, acidity, bitterness, salt & crunch; and holds up equally well as accompaniment to a rich, fatty protein like these plum-glazed pork country ribs (you […]

I bought a pomegranate at the supermarket the other day. Breaking news! Film at 11! I know: it’s hardly newsworthy. But it is a bit of a rarity around here; I don’t go to the ‘big’ market all that often, you see. Nearly all of my fresh food comes from a few local farms (Gossett Brother’s Farm Market, John Boy’s Outpost and Holbrook Farm being the biggies), while grains, nuts, oils, and the like I generally get at my little […]

My beloved New England Revolution played in the MLS Cup in Los Angeles last weekend. For the fifth time in a dozen years, the Revs battled it out in the championship game of Major League Soccer. For the fifth time, I jumped up and down in the stands; I clapped and sang, I rejoiced and cried. For the fifth time, I sat dejected in a stadium parking lot, nursing a beer with a few hundred die-hard New England fans, all of […]

Fattoush. Fattoush. Fattoush. It’s just fun to say, no? Traditionally, fattoush is a Lebanese mezze, a salad composed of tomatoes and cucumbers, often radishes and green peppers, and some form of greens, usually purslane. It was also a type of Middle Eastern panzanella: a way to use up day-old stale pita bread, which was fried into crispy croutons and then tossed with a fragrant salad, flavored with the distinctive sour note of a sumac, lemon & olive oil dressing. In […]

Well here we are folks: Day 7 of our Week of Leftovers. I’ve managed to post every day for a week, which is a small miracle in itself; and I’ve managed to come up with some inventive ways to fashion a week’s worth of meals out of celeriac soup, slow-roasted beef and a pot of beans. I hope you’ve enjoyed this little peek into my leftover-obsessed fridge. A week out, the last of the beef has gone into chili, the […]

Most of the meals I had in Panama fell into one simple category: meat on a stick. While I can’t claim to be a big fan of Panamanian cuisine; it’s very meat & starch-centric, with lots of fried food and nary a vegetable in sight; I can say that when it comes to carne en palito, Panama knows its stuff. Incredibly tender and moist chunks of chicken or beef, marinated and flavorful and perfectly grilled over an open flame: it’s enough […]

The last couple of days have finally felt like Spring in New York: bright sunshine, temps approaching 60 degrees F, tiny, pale green buds popping up on the trees and bright green new growth in our tiny patches of “lawn.” Amazingly enough, this run of warm, sunny weather is supposed to continue right through the weekend and into next week: could it be that Spring is actually here? (I wouldn’t lay bets that we’ve seen the last of this winter’s […]

Conversation I had with myself today: Me: “Can you still say “Israeli” couscous? I mean, is that kosher?” Myself: “Heh. Kosher. Get it?” Me: “You’re not helping. Is “Israeli” couscous still what we call it, or is that like saying “Oriental” when you’re not talking about a carpet? I: “Why don’t we call them Asian carpets anyway? How come oriental carpet is still OK, but oriental anything else is verboten?” Myself: “Well, Asian tends to piss off India, since they […]

Cock-a-leekie, cock-a-leekie, cock-a-leekie: it’s too much fun to say! Have you ever had cock-a-leekie soup? It’s a traditional Scottish soup, made of chicken stock, leeks and little else (except prunes. Ew.). Despite many business trips to Edinburgh in my past, and the fact that I am of Scottish descent (my maternal grandfather emigrated from Glasgow), I’ve never had it. If I had ever seen it on a restaurant menu, I probably would have ordered it (despite the prunes; ew), just […]

The last time I ate beef was the summer of 1987. I remember it quite well: I was home from college, working in Boston as a temp secretary for a rather stuffy accounting firm down at South Station, and living out near Boston College with some friends. The father of one of my roommates was in town on business and decided to take “us girls” out to dinner. He chose Anthony’s Pier 4, which was a bit of a thrill […]

I’ve been making this dish for about a million years. Maybe a million and one. Even in the days when I didn’t really cook, living in Manhattan or in my teeny-tiny, 350-square-foot apartment in Boston’s North End, I would whip this up when Fall arrived, as a potluck dinner contribution or for a family Thanksgiving. I’m not quite sure why it’s never made it to these (hallowed) pages: maybe because I’ve been making it so long, it has ceased to […]

Hands up, who likes okra? <cricket, cricket> I thought so. Me either. I mean, it looks like something the Star Trek crew would have spray-painted orange and pretended was exotic, alien fruit; it’s skin is hairy and kind of spiky; fresh okra seems to get limp and slimy after 10 minutes in the fridge; and let’s not even talk about the snot that oozes out once we slice it, hmm? Yet, despite my lack of love for the spiky green […]

Two down, one to go: my quest to use up the CSA chard (before more gets delivered on Wednesday) is proceeding apace. This zucchini gratin recipe from Simply Recipes came across my reader the other day and well: cheese, bacon, onions, garlic? Even the zucchini-weary can get behind that plan. I made a few changes of course: I cut the recipe roughly in half, since only one of our household will consume the “Evil Weed.” (Since I do the cooking, […]

I don’t know about you, but this time of year I usually start craving complex carbs like mad: bread, pasta, crackers; I can’t keep enough of them in the house. I think it’s because the vegetables just keep rolling in: the fridge is stuffed full of leafy greens, summer squash, bell peppers, green beans, and corn on the cob, not to mention the piles of tomatoes on the counter and the fruit! It’s an amazing time of year for a local […]

Have you ever spent an entire day in a jumpy house with a 7 year-old? Let me just tell you, for the sake of science, that it is possible to pull every sinlge muscle in your body at the same time, especially when, inspired by giggling, 7 year-old cries of “Do it again!,” you demonstrate your NBA-style, windmilling slam dunk on the jumpy house baskbetball net about 847 times. My friend Kami celebrated her 7th birthday a couple of weeks ago […]